Drizzle
by Edhla
Summary: Sherlock and John are on the run somewhere. But Lestrade's not too worried. They'll show up again somewhere soon enough, and then they'll get this whole kidnapping business sorted out. A Reichenbach one-shot drabbly thing.


**A/N- This is a stand-alone one-shot, but it occurs in the same headcanon/universe as "After the Fall" and can be read as a sort of prequel to it.**

* * *

The fourth floor, south-side vending machine was less like a business transaction and more like a wheel of fortune. You put your money in, pressed your selection. Sometimes it jammed. Sometimes it gave you something else. Sometimes it spat out chocolate and crisps and drinks all over the place. Sometimes it did absolutely bloody nothing at all.

Occasionally, it gave you exactly what you wanted, and nothing else.

Lestrade kicked the machine gently with the side of his foot, until it yielded what _he_ wanted- Coke- then retrieved it from the dispenser and stalked back to his office. Ordinarily it would have been coffee, but somebody had poured the last from the percolator and hadn't bothered to brew more which, in that particular kitchenette, was almost a capital offence. Somebody had already got to the percolator before Lestrade and had taped a note to it:

_Hi! I'm a coffee percolator! I distribute coffee to fifteen overworked underpaid detectives. Or I do when I am filled._

_(If you have taken the last of the coffee the least you could do is make more you selfish shit.)_

Lestrade had left the note there and added another, scribbled on a piece of paper ripped out of his notebook:

_Hi! I'm DI Lestrade, and I'm your boss! I oversee fifteen overworked, underpaid detectives and I drink coffee too._

_(If I catch who's leaving notes like this I'll be reporting them AND the selfish shit who's drinking all the coffee.)_

It had taken just as much time and effort to write the note as it would have done to simply make more coffee, but that wasn't the point. All he really wanted was something to keep him awake.

It had been one hell of a night.

Cancel that. It'd been one hell of a _week_.

After the drama at Baker Street the night before, Lestrade was honestly surprised he'd been asked to come into work at all. But then, it wasn't _his_ fault that John had punched Dawson (he'd missed that, much to his disappointment), and it wasn't his fault that Sherlock had pulled a gun on the police and escaped with John as a… hostage, apparently. And God knew where the two of them were now, so it certainly wasn't his fault they hadn't yet been found. He had his best people out looking for them.

He hadn't asked any of them to make enquiries at St Bartholomew's hospital. Nor had he asked Molly Hooper if she'd seen her friends recently.

It had been a beautiful morning- fresh and bright, scattered clouds. But the clouds had set in quickly, and then a haze of drizzle. Lestrade gazed out the window absently, looking at the shining pavement, the drips coming off the eaves of the adjoining building, the assortment of dark and bright umbrellas on the street below that seemed, from above, to be transporting themselves. The rain back home was cleansing. The rain in London just made everything dirty _and _wet.

And he was supposed to be working, not staring out the window. He turned back to the desk and reached out absently for the Coke.

One sip, and he grimaced- it was vile. Sweet enough to put you in a diabetic coma. Not the same idea as coffee at all. He was just wondering to himself whether it'd be worth backing down and making more coffee (or telling Thompson to) when there was a knock on the open office door.

Sally Donovan was also looking slightly worse for wear this morning- bleary-eyed, hair still slightly damp and smelling strongly of shampoo. Obviously hadn't slept much the night before, though she'd technically been off the clock for eight hours in between Fun Times at Baker Street and the day of paperwork and follow-up investigations that generally followed anything that Sherlock Holmes took it into his head to do.

"Donovan. Any news on the Bruhl kids?" Lestrade was pretending to be absorbed in the official report into the kidnapping, even though he could probably have recited it by then. The last thing he wanted was the company of Sally Donovan.

"Their mother's arrived at the hospital this morning." The father, Lestrade knew, had arrived back in London at around ten the night before.

"How are they doing?"

"Not well. Max is still unconscious and Claudette had a very bad night of it. She still won't speak…"

Lestrade had a sneaking suspicion that he wanted Claudette to start speaking not so much for her own mental health, but so that she could, clearly and unequivocally, say why she'd screamed at Sherlock last night. It wasn't because he'd kidnapped her- there had to be some other reason. For all he knew, she'd been conditioned to be afraid of baritones or blue scarves.

Poor kid had no idea the drama she'd unleashed.

Donovan was still standing in the doorway. Evidently she hadn't come in to discuss the Bruhl kids. He looked up at her expectantly.

"What's the matter?"

"Sir, I think you'd better come downstairs. John Watson's just turned himself in."

"What? You mean to say he's downstairs?" Lestrade got up. "Where's Sherlock?"

"We don't know. John's asked for you, and won't talk to anyone else."

* * *

It was hardly a surprise that John wasn't going to talk to _Donovan_, anyway. Lestrade went down to the front foyer where DS Lucy Parnell met him. Good officer, Parnell. Lestrade had often wondered why _Parnell _couldn't be his right-hand woman. She was a lot easier to get along with than Donovan. Less mouth.

"Sir, John Watson."

"Yes. Where is he?"

"Interview room four. Not in a good way, sir."

Lestrade didn't pause to ask what _not in a good way _was meant to mean. He went down the corridor and around to room four, tapping on the door and stepping in when bidden to do so. DCs Matt Carroll and Brooke Prescott were in attendance. Brand new on the squad, Matt was mild and subservient and most of his workmates, while they liked him, respected him only a little above the work experience kid. Prescott was almost as recent, but she was making a good impression. Solid, by-the-book, lacking in imagination and perhaps in intelligence, but a very decent copper.

Lestrade wasn't really paying attention to Carroll or Prescott, though. Wherever the hell Sherlock was and however John had come to turn himself in, the man looked awful- grey-faced and shaking. On seeing him, Lestrade stopped short.

"Oh for God's sake. Why have you cuffed him? He _gave himself up."_

"Orders, sir. He-"

"Yeah, I know what he did last night, and those are not _my _orders. Uncuff him."

"Keys are at the front desk, sir." A security measure, theoretically. Most officers had worked out that the need to uncuff someone in a hurry was more likely than being overpowered by a cuffed suspect mugging them for the keys, and disregarded it. Not Prescott. Not yet, anyway. Give her time, she was going to get awfully sick of trips to the front desk.

"We'll wait. Matt, go and get Dr Watson some strong coffee, will you?"

Matt Carroll had yet to earn his way into being addressed by his surname. Both he and Prescott were looking at each other uncertainly before Prescott, looking mightily put out, left. Matt, having slightly more imagination, was still hesitating.

"Did you hear me ask you to get coffee, Matt?"

"But-"

"This isn't an official interview, so I don't need a minder. Go on."

Non-interview or not, Matt knew that he was in for a world of trouble if he left a single officer in charge of a suspect who'd assaulted the Chief Superintendant only the night before. Even more trouble if it was taken into account that the suspect was a personal friend of the DI.

"Sir, for safety reasons and-"

"He's given himself up peacefully, and he's handcuffed. I'd say he'd be a pretty unlikely assailant."

"Sir…"

Lestrade stared Matt down- stare-downs were his speciality- until he muttered an assent and left. The heavy door clunked behind him as Lestrade slipped into the seat he'd vacated.

John had been watching all this like a man who was sleepwalking. Passive. Expressionless, even. For a second, Lestrade wondered if he knew where he was. He flinched slightly as Lestrade pulled up his chair.

"Did they read you your rights, John? Offer you access to legal services?"

He nodded dazedly.

"Is there anyone you want me to call, let them know you're here? Mrs Hudson, or Harry-?"

This time it was a head shake.

Lestrade glanced up at the security camera to check that there was no tell-tale blinking red light. "And do you understand that anything you say to me in this room, when it's just us and there's no tape recorder or camera running or anything, is strictly off the record?"

"Yeah," he muttered. Both hands were resting on the table, fists clenched; the cuff chain rattled against itself, gently but insistently, between them. There was blood under both thumbnails, and grazes on the knuckles of his right hand.

"You look bloody awful. Are you all right? I mean, do you need medical treatment?" Lestrade thought he could smell blood, just vaguely, but perhaps that was his imagination. With a table between them, he couldn't see what other officers had noted- the patches of blood on John's knees. But John shook his head.

"John, where's Sherlock?"

John swallowed. He was looking at his hands.

"Is he all right? Is he safe? We'll get this sorted out, John. But I need to know where he is."

But even as he spoke, Lestrade knew they weren't going to get this sorted out. John would never have left Sherlock somewhere on his own to give himself up out of a sense of moral duty.

"I left him behind at Barts," John told him. "I'm sorry. I'm afraid he's dead."

There was a brief knock at the door; a soft jangling noise from behind it. Prescott was back with the keys.


End file.
